


In This World

by jupitans



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Angst, Canon Divergence, Depictions of depression, Depression, F/M, Mental Illness, PTSD, Post-Mockingjay, finally lmao, katniss pines, peeta is human, peeta is not as nice
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-22
Updated: 2018-08-26
Packaged: 2019-07-01 06:44:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15768720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jupitans/pseuds/jupitans
Summary: A re-imagining of sorts of the end of/post-mockingjay/pre-epilogue era of Katniss and Peeta, where Peeta is a human who has feelings and Katniss is learning to grow and heal.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Basically what I imagine what this time period was like, or should have been like. There are too many stories that paint Peeta as a perfect angel who is Katniss', for lack of a better term, little bitch. And he's not. He's great, but he's human. This will mainly focus on their relationship, but maybe other things too. enjoy :)
> 
> [also bear with the weird formatting, still tryna figure it out]

The first weeks were the worst.

As soon as my body hit my bed I went catatonic, as if someone had cut the power. My mind shut off and I couldn’t move. I know that during the first two days there was a bit off worry. I vaguely remember hands shaking my shoulders roughly, the echo of a worried plea in my ear. I didn’t care though. My mind was blank and only a blank darkness remained. It was comforting in a way. I knew that as long as my brain had that block nothing could get to me. No memories, no nightmares, no thoughts or images, nothing could hurt me at all. I was free. It was the most peace I had felt in ages.  
But at some point I opened my eyes again, though not for long. For a while, there was a steady drift in and out of consciousness. One moment awake, the next black. Every time I opened my eyes a new scene played out in front of me.

 _Blink_ , Buttercup sitting on the window sill, watching over me.

 _Blink_ , Greasy Sae spooning soup into my mouth.

 _Blink_ , Haymitch dropping a pile of letter unceremoniously on the side table.

_Blink_

The line between minutes and hours was blurred. Time didn’t exist as days bled into nights, a second no different from a week. The only indication that it even passed was that the hands of the clock on the wall would change positions every time I blinked back into reality. 

Occasionally it would rain, pouring against my window so the outside world was reduced to nothing more than a blur. Sometimes I would wake and see the moon, its light spilling in and bathing my sheets in a soft glow. A couple of times I would wake just to find the window closed. One time I opened my eyes just as the sun was setting. The edges of the night sky creeping down from blue to purple. Clouds lit up with brilliant reds that bled into yellow that faded further into a milder pink that finally melted into a soft and beautiful orange that gently touched everything around it, illuminating the room and… 

I shut my eyes tight.

I heard sounds as well. Birds chirping as the sun went up, crickets as the sun went down. Once or twice I heard broadcasts coming from the radio downstairs, but I couldn’t make myself listen to the announcements or news. Instead, Greasy Sae came up often. When she wasn’t not spooning me food, she talked. Nothing really that deep or with any expectation of a response, just anecdotes to fill the time. She said they were rebuilding the Hob, setting up makeshift stalls and such in the meantime. Her grand-niece lived with her now and was proving to be a bit of a handful. My mother was doing well in District 4. Gale was overseeing the reconstruction of the districts and seemed to be thriving with his new position. She never mentioned Peeta.

Haymitch would also come in and sit on the chair by the windowsill. He didn’t really do much. His legs bounce restlessly and his hands trembled. Sometimes he would leave and come back with a flask; his hands would stop trembling. Other times he would just grip the arms of the chair and jiggle his legs for what felt like ages. I know that in another time I’d have snapped at him for all this flitting. I think, or I liked to think, that maybe Haymitch thought that I actually would. But I couldn’t muster any sort of anger, resentment, even a mild annoyance. Sometimes he would start, as if he to take a jab at me or start some banter. The words seem to catch in his throat though, as he never quite got the line out. Instead he would swallow them back down, occasionally chased by a drink.

Finally, one day I wake up to voices arguing from downstairs.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go up there.” The tone is tense, a warning teetering on the edge of being a threat  
“Please Haymitch, I just want to see her.” My heart stalls. I knew that voice, I knew it like I know the back of my hand. I also knew that I did not want to see him. For the first time since I had taken my place in bed I felt fear, real fear, seep into my body, making its way through my bloodstream, turning me cold. Get out! I want to yell, but my mouth stayed glued shut.  
“Gale, I don’t know if she wants to see you.” I close my eyes tightly, thanking him silently from my position in the bed.  
“So what, am I just supposed to let her lay there forever? Am I just supposed to never talk to her again?”  
“She needs time-” “Time? Time! All anybody has given her is god damn time. It’s been almost a month. Sae told me she hasn’t moved, she hasn’t spoken, she’s barely eating, and I’m just supposed to let her do that? Sure she isn’t dead, but she may as fucking well be!” His words bite. There is a bitterness in them that make there way from his mouth right into my chest. 

_Has it really been that long?_  
_What am I doing?_  
_Am I just a dead man breathing?_

“Listen, I’m not going to stop you. But ask yourself, is this really for her, or is it just for you?” There’s a beat of silence. Before I hear steps walking up the stairs, making their way down the hall, before coming to an uneasy halt in front of my door.

I stay completely still, like an animal playing dead. Maybe if I don’t breath, don’t blink, don’t move, he’ll just go. The floorboards creak with the weight of his decision. Come in, or don’t. I shut my eyes and will him with all my might to leave. Five agonizing seconds go by before he finally makes his choice. Gale’s footsteps fade off, but it’s not until I hear the front door close that I finally feel myself breathe again. But it wasn’t just Gale that terrified me. I feel myself sit up. Well, I meagerly push myself up onto my arms, an act so strenuous I need a full minute to recompose myself.

I shuffle my body around so that I can place my feet on the floor. I look around, but the curtains are drawn so the room is dim and stuffy. The wood is cold beneath my soles and I shiver. I use the headboard to hoist myself onto my feet. I stand there for a second, waiting for my weight to fully balance out before I start making my way towards the door. I push it open and step into the hall. The window at the end of the hall lets in a long sweep of light. I walk towards it, finally getting a good look at the outside world for the first time in ages. It’s autumn, and the victor’s village looks as if it has been set ablaze. The trees are thick with fall leaves, and the ground has become a carpet of red, orange, and brown. It’s past midday. The sun lower in the sky, but not quite setting. I blink to make sure it’s all real.

“You’re up.” I turn quickly and find Haymitch standing at the other end of the hall by the top of the stairs. His words aren’t warm, and his mouth doesn’t smile, and his shoulders are held in place by tension.  
“Seems like it.” I want my response to be snarky, strong, and stable. I’m alive. I was fine the whole time. But my voice comes out cracked and hoarse. I swallow and open my mouth, but I can’t think of anything else to say. Haymitch looks me up and down, his brows pulling together in a slight grimace.  
“Take a shower. You look like hell,” and I just about want to cry with relief as he turns to make his way back down the stairs. He’s about halfway down when he speaks one more time. 

“And call your mom. She’s been waiting to hear from you,” and he leaves.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here's a second part! Okay, I will admit I'm taking a few (a lot) liberties with the story and characterization, but it just feels more fitting to me I guess. I don't know, a lot is skipped over or not in great detail in the ending of the books and the last time I gave these a proper read was a while ago. Also, Peeta's still not here but bare with me ok? It's coming.

I stand in front of the mirror trying to convince my brain that it’s really me in the reflection, and not a stranger, staring back.

The girl in the mirror raises her hand to her face, tracing her brow, ghosting over her eyes that protrude out and her cheeks that have sunken in, and finally graze over pale scar tissue that has inched its way onto her jaw. Her hand trails down her body, going over every bone that protrudes out due to malnourishment. Her body is covered in a thick layer of grime which tints the skin a disgusting colour of grey.

Well that is, the parts that aren’t scarred over. Where it has been burnt, the skin is lumpy, papery, and uneven to the touch. Looking at the mirror I can see the piece patchwork of skin grafts that her body has essentially become. Lastly she touches her hair. It’s a tangled mess that is so unclean it looks wet. I remember a time when that hair was a a carefully cultivated part of an icon of the nation. When children braided their own hair so they could be just like the girl on TV. But now? Sticking to her face and body? She looks like a pathetic wet dog. Her eyes stare at me, almost guiltily. As if she were apologizing for how she looked, that I had to see her like this. That I had to be her. 

I feel my heart racing, pounding against my ribcage. I hate this girl. She is pitiful, she is vain, she is weak. I am not that. I am not weak. I pick up the brush that lay next to the sink and try to detangle the mess on my head. It gets stuck, and I end up pulling out a clump of hair. I keep going. This is who I am. The girl is me. My sight gets blurry and it’s not until I finally blink that I realize I’m crying. Dammit. I wipe the tears out of my eyes and I finally feel a scream leave my throat, one that burns as it comes out of my mouth. My hands shake as yank open the drawers under the sink, and when I can’t find what I’m looking for, I rip open the sink cabinet. It’s like I’m detached from my body as I search, throwing towels and bottles around the bathroom. I feel another scream leave my chest and I can’t find them. I look on the shower shelf and on the floor. Nothing.

I pull at the mirror off its hanger in a fit of fury and scream again as it comes crashing to the floor. Then I finally see what I am looking for. A straight razor taped to the wall, hidden out of sight. I use it to saw at the sections of my hair, letting it fall in thick chunks around my body. I stared at myself again. My hair now hung unevenly around my chin, but it still wasn’t enough. So I went shorter.  
I cut it down to about 3 centimeters, and I laughed at how much of a lunatic I looked like. The thin and bald spots were now more visible than ever. My hair sticks out in every direction, making me look more like a tarred chicken than anything else.

“Dammit!” It leaves my mouth with I smile because I am crazy. And I can’t stop laughing. Because beautiful face of the rebellion is now a balding headcase

It takes a full minute for me to stop laughing before I come to a stop. My hands tremble as I lean into the mirror and begin to carefully shave off the remaining hair as closely as possible. I nick myself dozens of times, so when I’m done I look like a freshly sheared lamb. I smooth my hand over my pale scalp. That was not me. That was not who I am. I pick a towel off up the ground and place it over the mirror before I step in the shower to wash off the last traces of who I was.

...

I step out and feel a vague stinging sensation over my whole body as my freshly scrubbed skin hits the air. I can feel the pain of friction as I grab a fresh towel and wrap myself, but it’s not a bad pain. Far from it. I feel new and raw, as if I was born again. I go back to my room open the dresser drawers to look for something to wear.

I rifle through the clothing that has sat, untouched, for months. In the first drawer, there are piles of neatly folded, nice, capitol-issued clothing that I steer clear of. The second has much less in it, just my own clothes from home, thrown in haphazardly as I could never be bothered to fold my laundry. The third drawer on the top row is nearly empty, save for two small stacks of neatly folded shirts, one of witch belongs to Haymitch.

The other is Peeta’s. I know they are because in the weeks leading up to the quarter quell, when we were “training”, we would often return gross and dirty. It was becoming a pain to run back and forth between all of our houses, so Peeta suggested he and Haymitch just keep a couple of spare shirts here to change into if needed. It was pure convenience at the time.   
I gingerly picked up one of the shirts, one of soft cotton that is a pale blue. I stroke the material softly and stare at it. I can’t say exactly why, but I pulled it over my head. Immediately I was engulfed in a smell that had me reeling back in time.

Predominantly, the homemade soap that my mother would use to wash the clothes we wrecked and soiled. It was much nicer than the stuff you get on the market, mainly thanks Lady’s milk. It kept any clothing soft. I can hear Peeta faintly protesting, saying he can wash his own clothes. My mom takes the shirts from him firmly, and says it’s no problem. But fainter than that is the scent of baked bread, the scent of skin, the scent I woke up to many times in the middle of the night, and a scent I couldn’t forget. All this, captured and preserved, in a slightly worn t-shirt that was abandoned in a drawer in a house no one thought they would return to. It hung off me like a dress on a hanger, but I couldn’t bothered to change it. I put on a pair of old pants before leaving the room and making my way downstairs to the kitchen.

Haymitch is sitting turned away from me. One hand holds a mug while the other has a book propped open, which I guess he’s reading.

“Glad that you could finally join us. The whole ‘catatonic vegetable’ act was getting pretty-” His head turns and when he finally sees me he freezes. I wring my hands together and stand still in the middle of the kitchen. He raises his eyebrows.

He lets out a slow whistle. “Wow. Who are you trying to impress sweetheart? New hairdo and everything.” Immediately my face burns up. I can feel blood rush to my head and clench my fist, digging my nails into my palms just to stop from yelling.

“Go to hell, my hair was a mess,” I spit out angrily.

“Get a hairbrush,” Haymitch shoots back.

“I just wanted to do something okay? Can we please not talk about it?”

“Not talk about it? Not talk about it! Sweetheart, you come down here after your month-long coma, which newsflash is not a particularly healthy coping mechanism, and you’ve got all your hair sheared off looking like a god damned peeled potato and you expect me not to say anything about it?” There’s a beat of silence.

“Yeah. Basically.”

“Oh my god, see this is why Sae and I are the only one who-”

“You and I are the only ones who what?” And Sae walks in through the door and damn near drops the plate she was carrying. “What did you do?” She says it calmly, but her wide eyes tell a different story.  
“I cut my hair. It was too long, and-” “No, I mean how did you do it?” She is worried, looking me up and down, as if I’m some sort of sick animal. “There was a straight razor behind the mirror, so I took it and-”

Sae slams the plate on the table in front of Haymitch and glares at him. “Haymitch, what the hell were you doing leaving a straight razor up there?” He throws up his hands up, as if to deflect her accusation. “Well I hid it first of all. Second of all, I didn’t know she was going to do the whole psychotic heroine act.” He leans back into his chair grumbling, taking a sip from his mug. Sae sighs, exasperated. “Haymitch you know what Dr. Aurelius said. She can’t have any access to sharp or potentially harmful object with her current mental status-”

“ _What_ mental status?” I say angrily, cutting Sae off in the middle of her sentence. They both finally look back at me, slightly taken aback as if they had forgotten I was there. “Why am I not allowed near ‘potentially harmful objects’?” Haymitch rolls his eyes and says, “Well, to be quite honest sweetheart, killing the leader of the rebellion that you had publicly pledged your life to doesn’t paint you as paragon of mental stability.”

I want to say something but all I can do is stand, gaping like a fish as Sae picks up her dish again and starts washing it in the sink. “Anyway, you should be grateful that you are ‘mentally impaired’, because that’s really the only thing keeping you from imprisonment.”

I let out a sigh and finally take a seat in one of the chairs. We sit there as Haymitch drinks and reads and Sae places a plate of toast in front of me. I stare at it, but don’t make a move to touch it.

“What about Peeta?” There’s another uncomfortable silence before Sae breaks it.

“Well, he’s still in the capitol. After all that happened-”

“To be honest, you’re the little stunt you pulled didn’t really leave him in the best of spirits either.” Haymitch interrupts her before he can finish her sentence. “He’s been placed up there for ‘extended treatment’.” I can feel my chest clench. “Is he coming back?” And as I ask, I don’t really know if I’m prepared or not for the answer.  
Haymitch puts down his book. “I don’t know when. Or if.” We look at each other, and I feel at a loss. Twice now, I’ve broken the promise we made before the second games. When it was down to Peeta and I, he would be the one coming home. Yet here I am, and here he’s not. 

“Okay.” I don’t say anything more because there’s nothing more I can say. I made it home and he didn’t.

I push the chair back and leave, toast still untouched, making my way to the living room. The phone hangs on the wall with a small card balanced on top of it. I take the card in my hand and pick up the phone. I dial the number on the card and wait while it rings, tapping my foot impatiently against the carpeted floor.

“Hello?” The voice is clipped and firm. She has things to do, and does not have time to be wasting on trivial phone calls.

“Mom?” I try to keep my voice as steady as hers.

“Katniss,” she stumbles a bit over her words, “Katniss, hi. How are you?”

“I’m… I’m alright,” I say back, because I don’t know what else to say.

“Really?” “Yeah.” “Okay, that’s good.” I can hear how she is tiptoeing around me, even over the phone, and I hate it. I want her to say something, anything.

“How is your new job?” I ask.

“It’s good. There’s a lot to be done so I stay busy.”

“That’s good.”

“Have you talked too Dr. Aurelius?”

“No. Not yet.”

“Make sure you talk to him.”

“Okay,” then we both don’t say anything, just breathing over the phone line waiting for the other to finally talk about it or hang up.

“Haymitch said you were waiting for me to call.” I flinch and immediately regret letting the words escape my mouth. I sound like a desperate child trying to needle a reaction out of someone.

“I was. I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You were out for a while. I… I was worried that you had-”

“No. I’m didn’t. I’m not. I’m fine. I’m not like you.” That was harsh, too harsh. I can feel the guilt burning in my stomach because while I was lying in bed stuck, my mother was working and building a new life, for herself and for others. 

“I know you’re not,” is her gracious answer, said in an even tone that makes me feel even more like a child.

“I need to go.” I say suddenly, because I’m not sure how long I can keep myself from cracking. I can feel the pressure building in my chest, ready to burst at any moment.

I’m about to hang up the phone when she says, “Katniss.”   
I pause and answer, “Yeah?” “Please call again. I do want to hear from you.” I nod, even though she can’t see me.

“Alright.” Then I hang up the phone, not waiting to hear what she would say next.


End file.
